With the All-Star break over and the second half the baseball season upon us, the talk of buying and selling in anticipation of the July 31st trade deadline will be heating up. Unlike in past years, however, the Detroit Tiger’s do not know if they will be buying once again or finally be in sell mode.
As of 7-17 they are 44-44 on the 2015 season and are 9 games back of the leading Royals for the division and 3.5 games back of the second wildcard spot with the Ray’s and O’s also ahead of them. The next two weeks will go a long way into determining what the Tiger’s roster will look like on August 1st.
With every game from today until July 26th being against teams with a .500 record or worse, the Tiger’s could easily gain ground in the wildcard race. If they continue to flounder though, it could mean the end of the line for David Price, Yoenis Cespedes and Joakim Soria in a Tiger’s uniform as all three are due to become free agents at seasons end.
If the Tiger’s do reel off a few wins in a row and find themselves leading the wildcard race near the deadline names like Johnny Cueto, Cole Hamels, Jonathan Papelbon and Troy Tulowitzki will be available. Keeping in mind the past Houdini like trades pulled off by GM Dave Dombrowski and the seemingly bottomless pockets of Owner Mike Ilitch even names like these could end up sporting the Old English D even with little prospects for the Tiger’s to trade off.
